The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1887-07-23

committed 10 1t; Sklllful In dividing
clean and straight the sought" from the
sought not"
When we know good from evil, the
faculty by which we choose one and re-
ject the other, is called the will. Within
the bound of certain providential adap-
tations and restraining forces, God has
left US free to choose our own course of
action. He has given us reason, con-
science and sense of obligation to him
self; he has affixed penalties to laws,
and in this way bound us to certain
lines of thought and of conduct. Within
this limit our will is free. This is the
seat of volition. In this faculty abide
the causes of success or failure in every
effort we make to follow the good, or
shun the evil. Our lives are almost
entirely a matter of whether we will
take evil for good, and receive it as
friend, or whether we will take evil for
evil and know 1t as an enemy. The
danger to which the young and inexpe-
rienced are exposed, is first in not
knowing right from wrong, and next in
not having the will under such control
as always to choose the good and then,
hold steadily to it in spite of all the
allurements of evil. In order, therefore,
to conserve moral power we need to
educate and fortify the will, the faculty
by which we choose, and by which we
hold to the right. We need to have a
strong purpose of duty. Not simply a
wish or an intention to do our duty
when we chance to see it, but strong
purpose to seek it out, and then to do it
at any personal cost. This purpose
concentrates and unites the forces of
character.
This was in eminent degree the
case with Jesus. 81 must be about my
Fathers business" 81 came down from
heaven to do the will Of my Father in
heaven" Jesus lived by eternal truth;
he taught, and wrought by faith in
eternal things; the principles by which
he shaped his thought and conduct we're
eternal; therefore, he dwelt in eternity.
The aspirations he felt, the hope he
cherished, the guide he trusted, had
their home in heaven; hence in his con-
descension to ordinary men he came
down from heaven, down from these
heavenly places and guides. So of
Paul. "For me to live is Christ" 81
live no longer, but Christ lives in me-"
In this way Paul indicates his unalter-
able purpose to live in full fellowship
with God and with Jesus. "The man
who is determined to obey the divine
command in his conscience, and to be
led by the spirit which dwells in his
soul is strengthened with might by that
spirit in the inner man. The world is
always irving to pull us down to its
own level; to overcome the world we
must hold fast to the everlasting law of
justice, and open our souls to the in
flux of the Infinite love-"
One unfailing means, then, by which
we may conserve moral power, is by
training the conscience through which
we perceive truth, into tender sensitive
ness, and the will, by which we choose
and grasp it, into answering strength
and steadiness. Another means by
which to conserve this wondrous power
is by habit. Persuade the will into
the proper channel, and steady it
there for sufficient length of time, and
one will do easily and unconsciously
after a while, what he could only do
consciously and with difficulty at first.
Confucius said; cat sixty my ear was
an obedient organ for the reception of
truth. At seventy could follow what
my heart desired without transgressing
what was right" The disengagement
of the conscience and will from the
bondage of evil thought and act, and
the attachment of them to some noble,
pure, lofty purpose, is the prize Of
soul which presses forward continually
toward the mark of its upward calling.
"He, who, by strength of purpose, has
restrained his appetites and passions,
and then, by habit, compelled them to
act with mechanical unreluctance, is
virtually reinstated in the innocence of
childhood"
A word or two as to the way in which
this may be done. Herbert Spencer
says: sit is corollary from that pri-
mordial truth which underlies all other
truth, that whatever amount of power
an organism expends in any shape, is
the correlate and equivalent of power
that was taken into it from without"
The inexhaustible, outward supply of
spiritual power, by all the testimony
we can gather, is proven to be faith in
Christ as the Lamb of God that
taketh away the sin of the world. This
is the secret of all sincere confession of
what Christ has done for human souls
Care should always be taken to give
due weight to that almost universal
agreement among Christians concern
ing the work of Christ in the soul. AS
The sent of the Father to bear witness to
the truth, he is the unfailing fountain